


et si la terre est sombre

by brighter



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Anxiety, Certified 90-Percent Hockey Free!, Fluff, French, Happy Ending, Humor, M/M, Minor Angst, Tutoring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-08
Updated: 2016-10-08
Packaged: 2018-08-20 04:26:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8236055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brighter/pseuds/brighter
Summary: Eric is bad at French, and Jack is bad at not falling in love.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Title from [_Crier Tout Bas_](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prDIosFkEbI) by Cœur de Pirate.
> 
>  **Warning:** Some mentions of anxiety and anxiety symptoms. (Very brief mentions of medication abuse and hospitalization.) Please keep safe. :)
> 
>  **Disclaimer:** I’m hardly as wonderful as [ ngozi](http://ngoziu.tumblr.com/), who made this world called [ Check Please!](http://omgcheckplease.tumblr.com/) that I decided to screw up by taking out all the hockey.

The first time he meets Eric Bittle, he's talking to himself.

 

The library is cold this evening: snow settling on windows like whales beaching on shore. He likes the way they overlap, making him think that maybe the universe isn’t so lonely after all. Jack wants to preserve this moment. He gets up, phone in hand. When he turns the corner, he hears someone whispering in a manner that doesn’t reduce volume at all.

 

“ _Bonjer,_ ” a boy says, " _je m’apple Eric._ "

 

It's sort of painful to witness his language mangled like that. He couldn’t begin to comprehend how _appelle_ could be confused with _apple_. But he can see the boy is trying, chin cradled by his palm, squinting at the beginner’s French textbook. It’s nearly endearing. All Jack’s bitterness fades away when he takes one glance at the boy’s face and can see how desperately he wants to get it right.

 

Jack snaps the picture. It’s out of focus, like most snowflakes tend to be, evading light. If he sends it to his mom, he knows she’ll smile regardless and send him those faces she likes. Jack decides to sit on a table across from this _Eric_ , opening up his laptop. _All Quiet on the Western Front_ lies forgotten in his bag. He acts like he’s reading with great urgence, but the screen is off. 

 

“ _Bonjer,_ ” the boy says again. The accent is atrocious. Jack smiles.

 

* * *

 

He wants to make it a tradition, going to the library. He’s not a library sort of guy, but lately he’s thinking to become one. It smells like books, of course, and the lights are gentler, somehow. Here, the world is calm: like a monster curling up to go to sleep. _The cute blond boy,_ he argues, _is just a perk._

 

“ _Je suis, tu es, il est,_ ” Eric says, but his pronunciation is all wrong. Jack giggles behind his textbook. God help him, he hasn’t giggled since primary school. The boy begins to frown, and Jack is personally affronted. Eric has the kind of face that should never have a frown on it. He remembers conjugation charts, endless hours in white classroom walls, hand strained from the copying. Jack frowns a bit, too.

 

The boy is singing the French alphabet next, and it’s nothing short of endearing. The sound spills, tinny, out of his earbuds. Eric is chasing the letters, always starting the last one just as the next one finishes. His lips mouth them over, barely making a sound. By the end, they’re both grinning, though Eric doesn’t know it. Before he can think about how stupid it is—how utterly out of character—he’s slinging his backpack over his shoulder and moving to stand next to Eric. 

 

“Hi,” Jack says, quietly.

 

“Hiya!” he says, “or maybe I should use _bonjer_.”

 

_He really shouldn’t,_ Jack thinks, but instead gently corrects, “ _bonjour_. Uh. I’m Jack. Do you need help?”  


“Oh gosh, do I. I’m Eric Bittle.”

 

Jack takes a seat next to him, the library chair hard and uncomfortable. He’s realizing how silly this all was. All his things were left behind; his notebooks are still open on the table across from them. There’s not enough time—he’s pretty sure the library closes within the hour—to be worth starting. Jack wants to say all this, say _I didn’t mean to be social_ , take it back as he backs away.

 

Instead, he says, “what do you need?” 

 

Eric beams.

 

* * *

 

He’s nervous. They agreed to meet after class to go over basic vocabulary, and he’s nervous. Jack _shouldn’t_ be nervous, it’s just a boy—a cute boy, but just a boy. And it’s not like this is a date _._ Jack’s helping him out. With French. _The language of love_ , his brain interrupts, and god _damn_. 

 

Jack spots Eric at a different corner of the library. It’s cozier: where the chairs give into couches. Eric is wearing a hoodie today, forest green and two sizes too big. It makes him look small, and Jack can’t explain why he suddenly wants to wrap Eric up tight in ten thousand blankets. Eric catches Jack’s gaze. He hopes nothing gives his thoughts away. 

 

Eric smiles huge enough that it must hurt. Jack wonders what it’s like to be so enthusiastically into every conversation.

 

“You came!” Eric says, “it was real nice of you to help me out.”

 

“Well, I haven’t done anything yet.” 

 

Eric’s smile doesn’t fade in the slightest. “So what’s with this conjugation thing?” he quips. “I’ve got a test coming up, and I’ve got a mind to just stop trying. My professor, she doles out these sheets like crazy, and I thought maybe we could get started with those?”

 

“ _Bien sûr,_ ” Jack says, and Eric’s already making a face.

 

* * *

 

It becomes a regularly scheduled feature in Jack’s life, the meetings at the library. Jack opens up folders like a metaphor for his heart as Eric paces around, reciting newly learned words. They poke each other with pencils, bicker over break frequency, eat too many snickerdoodles, and Jack is having a hard time pretending he's not having fun. There’s no set times, but if there were, Eric is never once late. He stumbles over _r_ s and forgets words, but he’s getting better yet. After a week, Eric comes through the door, smiling to his cheeks. He’s holding a test with a shiny 85. Jack wants to hug him—except _no_ , he doesn’t. He can’t.

 

“Good job,” he says, holding back the urge. His smile comes easier than it used to.

 

“Hey, I wanted to ask—I mean, I wanted to thank you. But I wanted to ask if you wanted to get dinner. I’d like to show you my southern hospitality, since you’ve been such a help to me,” Eric says, fiddling with the staple on the test paper. He’s not meeting Jack’s eyes. “And there’s this nice café I know on campus.”

 

Jack shouldn’t go. Parse taught Jack he’s destructive: the kind of person who’d create a whole city just to tear at its foundations. _And yet._ Seeing Eric makes his fingers itch to build something. 

 

“Sure,” Jack says, like putting down the first brick.

 

* * *

 

Jack realizes he has memories with Eric, now. He’s a Twitter addict beyond the point of recovery, with a frankly ridiculous penchant for selfies. Jack ends up in half of them, since he’s usually by Eric’s side, and Eric wants to “take advantage of the robot’s rare smiles” when he gets them. It’s not even conceivably about French, anymore—the fall term is over, and Eric’s waiting till next year to take French II—but they study together like they’ve forgotten how to be alone.

 

Their sessions moved from the library to Annie’s, which Eric says “is better, since there’s more pumpkin spice lattes.” Jack finds he doesn’t mind the constant chatter surrounding them—the heady smell of coffee, the fluorescent lights. It’s more background noise than conversation. Six years ago, Jack might have walked into the place and left with his breath shorter than he when he had entered. Today, Eric’s voice is loud enough to be the only thing that he hears.

 

Eric is acting _weird_ lately. His left leg is always bouncing where it didn’t used to, foot tapping to the songs faintly on the speakers. He licks his lips a lot, and god, isn’t that distracting. Sometimes, he catches Eric’s mind wandering. It becomes obvious Eric’s default state is “concerned.” Today, the concern is directed right at him. He can feel the stare as he reads.

 

“Eric? What’s up?”

 

“I just wanted to say—” Eric coughs, continues, “I know it’s kinda silly to confess this after all this time, but. Um. Everyone else calls me Bitty.”

 

Jack has the feeling that isn’t what he wanted to say, but decides to start using “Bitty”, anyway.

 

* * *

 

The snow is starting to melt, and Eric is drunk.

 

He’s also _late_ , which never happens. Jack sits, fiddles with his phone, orders a scone mostly out of obligation. It’s good, though, the kind of chocolate he’s always been fond of. Fifteen minutes in, the staff are stacking chairs, and telling him “no, please, sir, it’s no bother” as they wipe down all the tables but his.

 

When Eric comes in, he orders coffee—not black, which would concern Jack, but just with sugar, which is strange enough. Jack knows he’s drunk by the swing of his walk, the slur on his “hey,” where he draws the _y_ out too long. He sits on the chair, sinks into it for a second, then leans forward conspiratorially. 

 

“I like you,” Eric says, like a secret. Jack freezes. This is not what he planned for tonight. This is not what he planned for Eric. He wishes, of course, but that’s all it can be, could ever be: wishes. Jack swallows, but his throat is dry. _He doesn’t mean it like that_ , Jack thinks. _Get a fucking grip._

 

“I like you too, Bitty. Thanks.” It’s awkward and stilted, but what can he even say? 

 

While he’s trying to slow his thoughts, Eric places his hand on Jack’s knee and it feels like the his chest is coming apart. He inhales sharply. Eric is too close, and he smells sweet, like pastries on a bakery windowsill. Jack’s head spins. He wants to do this. But if he does, he’ll hurt Eric, which is just not allowed to happen. Jack thinks of Parse, his panicked texts weeks after the overdose, and he _can’t do this._

 

But Eric smiles, his face mostly grin, and whatever he was worried about is gone. He pulls back. Jack misses the presence immediately. And that night, Jack swears he won’t break this boy’s heart.

 

* * *

 

_oh my god i’m so embarrassed,_ Eric texts him. _i’m sorry for acting weird >:(_

 

Jack wakes to the buzz of the phone, and glares, bleary-eyed, at the screen. So it didn’t mean anything, after all.

 

* * *

 

Annie’s is closed on Sundays, but today, Eric asks to meet him at his dorm. This comes as a surprise. Jack says he’ll drop by later tonight. Apparently, he’s dead set on seeming like he has no other friends but Eric, which is truer than he wants it to be. He hasn’t been to Eric’s dorm before. When he knocks, he’s greeted with a bright smile and the scent of sugar. It’s cramped, like all dorms insist on being (he got an apartment first day here.) Despite this, he can see hints of Eric in the walls covered with Beyoncé posters and the kitchen filled with baking utensils, which makes Jack like the place immediately.

 

“I’ve got a maple-crust apple pie in the oven! Y’all are in _luck_ ,” he calls behind him, returning to the kitchen. The _y’all_ makes Jack: a) smile at the drawl Eric can’t shake on his best days and, b) notice they’re not alone. There’s a guy with long hair, not just facial, lying on the couch. Moustache is glancing half at the TV, but Jack knows the other eye is on him.

 

“Hey, I’m Jack,” he says, and the man appraises him. Not the way people used to—scanning him to see if he’s a hockey player worth his dad’s name. Not the way Kent would look him up and down slowly with his grin sinful _._ He looks _suspicious_ , like he’s searching Jack in case he might contain explosives. 

 

After the longest second, the man breaks into a smile, and replies: “I’m Shitty! Bitty talks all about you. Like, all the time. He’s obsessed.”

 

Eric walks in, hands in mittens and pie in hands. If he’s blushing, Jack doesn’t notice.

 

* * *

 

He figures he’ll return the favour, and invites Eric over the next Sunday. Jack spends the entire afternoon cleaning, which makes him feel a little silly. He shouldn’t care, but dusts the cabinets anyway. By the time Eric comes, the apartment smells like a chemical cocktail of Lysol and Febreze. Jack opens the door and breathes in sharply. Eric looks like a goddamn painting. His lips seem impossibly soft, and Jack wants to make sure his guess is right. He stares up at Jack expectantly, who had forgotten to say hello in all his blatant adoration.

 

Eric brought over pies, because of course he does. He belatedly puts together why Eric must smell amazing all the time. It turns out it’s the stupid pies that he’s falling for. But no, they’re not stupid. The pies are actually rather extraordinary: tart bursts of flavour on his tongue. They talk over them, forks in air. The crumbs on the corner of Eric’s lips make him want. He doesn’t act on it.

 

Eric stays for a long time. They’re on the couch, watching something Jack doesn’t know the name of, but it makes Eric laugh, which makes Jack wants to watch it forever. By the time the movie—show?—is over, Eric’s movements are heavy with fatigue. The rest of the world feels far away. 

 

They spend awhile talking, and somehow Eric’s head ends up on Jack’s chest. _This is how it should be,_ he believes. They fit together like trees that grow too close, roots entangled below them. Jack doesn’t think he could _exist_ without Eric, not since he first caught him rehearsing introductions. _And there will never be anybody else._

 

* * *

 

When he wakes up on the couch, it’s still dark. His back is sore and he’s warm all over his chest. Eric’s hand is fisted in his shirt. He feels content. It hurts because he knows he can’t have this. He proved years ago he couldn’t have this. Jack gives in to touch Eric’s hair, and it’s silkier than he imagined, like the best sort of sweater. He would bury his face in it, breathe it in like the last thing keeping him alive if he could.

 

Eric makes a happy “mmf” noise, which startles Jack enough to let go. “Don’t stop,” says Eric, voice lilting and sleepy. Jack returns his hand, reluctant this time. He thinks he might kiss him, if he doesn’t let go now. But Jack continues, knowing he’d go great lengths to hear that noise again. Jack figures he would don a spacesuit, land on some alien planet, and search for that noise like it was water on Mars.

 

Jack places his lips on Eric’s head, before he can stop himself, and drifts back to sleep.

 

* * *

 

 

The next time the waking world takes him, he hears two things: eggs frying, and Eric singing Béyonce loudly, a falsetto that doesn’t grate but isn’t meant for Broadway, either. He wonders if they’re going to acknowledge this lovely, awkward thing growing between them. For awhile, Jack stays, laying on the couch, looking everywhere but the kitchen. There’s a stain on the ceiling he’s not noticed before.

 

He gets up, and Eric hasn’t seen him, caught up in making what looks like pancake batter. Jack leans down, puts his mouth to Eric’s ear, and whispers “ _boo._ ” Eric starts, dropping a spoonful of flour. Jack didn’t even know he _had_ flour. Eric’s shirt, rumpled from sleep, worsens with the addition of the white powder. It’s the cutest thing Jack’s ever seen, at least since the last time he’d seen Eric.

 

“Jack Zimmerman, how dare you!” Eric exclaims, “I come here, fix you up a nice breakfast, and you _spook me!_ ” He’s pouting, but the illusion of anger is ruined by the laughter he bursts into moments after.

 

“Did I?” Jack says, feigning innocence.

 

“No pancakes for you!”

 

It’s too easy to fall into being with Eric. He wants a breakfast just like this one, years from now. He wants to wake up to Eric’s singing every day for the rest of his life. And while they’re sitting around Jack’s dented kitchen table, as Eric cuts up pancake pieces and dips them into the maple syrup his dad still brings over when he visits, Jack thinks he might let himself.

 

* * *

 

Jack wonders if he should text Kent. He’s felt in debt for a long time. They haven’t talked since that final post-hospital conversation. Jack barely remembers his voice. Sometimes, Jack gets these phantom memories: the ghosts that bring him to back that summer, the drinking, the pill bottles, the sex. 

 

_Do you think we were in love?_ he messages, and it’s seen right away. The love he feels now— _if this is love—_ is incredibly different from Parse. It blooms in his chest, settled in the cavity of the heart, aching like a sweet tooth. There’s no desperate need, here, just this awful, quiet pining. Instead of pushing him against a wall, grabbing at clothes, commanding with that voice he uses when he’s trying to be captain, Jack wants to take Eric by the hand, lead him to bed, whisper _just a little more_. It’s pathetic: the only way he knows how not to break someone’s heart is to ask the person he tore through like blades on ice.

 

He runs, for awhile, and checks his phone no less than six times. Kent is quiet.

 

* * *

 

The next time he sees Eric, he takes a step back. Every time Eric examines him like he’s something extraordinary, some rare earth mineral that glitters more than scientists thought possible, Jack steps back. On the walk home from Annie’s, their elbows bump once. Jack makes sure it’s only once. He doesn’t know why he won’t give into Eric, who so clearly wants him with his big, vulnerable eyes and heartbeat Jack can _hear._

 

“Are you all right?” Eric asks, his tone soft, like Jack would break if it weren’t. He’s starting to suspect Eric is right.

 

_If someone gave me a potion, I’d drain it into the pond, too scared to see what it might do._

 

“It’s fine,” Jack says, and leaves Eric on the steps of his dorm. Eric stands there, watching him go, his head crooked and brows furrowed. Jack pretends he doesn’t know that he’s doing anything wrong at all. Spring is evident, already blooming in the grass he hasn’t seen for months. He feels cold.

 

* * *

 

What he doesn’t expect is a phone call. He doesn’t really _get_ calls, save for _maman_ , whom he ignores most days. But this is different—he sees Eric’s face on the screen, cheeks flushed from when they’d gone skating. Eric is so damn good at skating, and never questions why Jack knows how. That day is the sort of day Jack will think of, years from now, wondering why he chose to be alone.

 

Unless he doesn’t. Jack swipes to answer.

 

“Hey?” he says, his voice sounding more lost than he’d prefer anyone heard.

 

There’s sniffling on the other end. “What did I do wrong?” Eric asks, “I thought—I thought we were having fun. I know I came on strong, but I didn’t expect…you to just—let me go like that.” Jack feels the accusation in his gut, like a strong punch on a bad day.

 

“I didn’t mean to,” Jack breathes, “I didn’t _know_.” Before he can think, he’s grabbing his jacket. Before he can stop, he’s in his car, driving to the dorm. He’s only been once, but the directions are burned into his mind. When Shitty answers the door, his face is strained. It tells a story Jack never wants to hear. He nods silently towards the left. Jack finds Eric in his room, clutching a well-loved bunny. There are crumpled tissues all over his bed.

 

Jack places a hand on his back. Eric stiffens underneath it. Jack says, “ _Bitty._ ”

 

Eric is quiet for a long time, the silence interrupted by his short, panicked gasps. “Are we still…” Eric asks, not knowing how to complete the sentence. Not how Jack does now. Eric’s cheeks are wet, his hair mussed, and Jack knows for certain there is no one more beautiful.

 

“Together,” Jack says. Eric gives him the littlest smile, but it’s a start.

 

* * *

 

Montréal calls him home. The air there feels fresher, rainy days just as frequent but shorter. His parents worked on teaching Jack how to smile again. It’s more effective than he’d expected.

 

When he gets to see Eric, it’s to learn French, like Jack hadn’t had enough of that already. Eric is wearing a short-sleeved shirt. His arms are strong, like he’s been working out all break just to torture Jack this very moment. “I’ve been practicing over the summer,” Eric says proudly. Jack wants to say _oh_ yeah, _you have._ “Good news: I might have gotten the hang of present tense.”

 

“Try me,” Jack chuckles. Eric looks at him like a challenge. Things between them are natural, like when he first held a hockey stick and felt like he was home. 

 

“ _Je t’aime?_ ” Eric tries, voice higher on the last word. Jack is exuberant. 

 

“You mean _tu m’aime_.” 

 

Eric frowns, “did I really butcher it that bad?”

 

“Totally. I like you, not the other way around.”

 

Eric is laughing, now. It’s the purest sound Jack knows—probably too loud for the library, but he thinks everyone should appreciate it anyway. Jack wants to capture that laugh, listen to it on nights when his chest is tight until his fists unclench and the blood rushes back to his head. Jack wants to hear this sound when he’s eighty and the stairs are too steep for his old bones. Jack wants to make Eric laugh until their chests ache, and it’s too much, but it never is. Jack wants Eric to laugh into his shoulder, between his thighs, into a pillow in _their_ apartment. Jack wants, and wants so much, and when he _finally, finally_ kisses Eric, he’s still laughing.

 

Until he isn’t. Until Eric is kissing back, and it feels like something in the universe has shifted into place. Eric kisses like a promise. Jack pulls away, just to look into Eric’s eyes and know they’ve gotten it right. When he captures Eric’s mouth again, the kiss transforms: filled with all the need they couldn’t share. Their mouths move like opposing tides—and if they are, he is drowning.

 

When they let go, Jack is close enough to count each freckle. Eric says, “so sure, I’m bad at French. But I'm not bad at frenching.”

 

Jack chokes.

**Author's Note:**

> The coolest thing in the world is comments, and the second coolest thing is kudos. The third coolest thing is ice. The fourth cooling thing is our sun, but very slowly, until it will one day devour our earth.
> 
> (What I'm trying to say is, please leave criticism or love or links to good poetry below. It would make me smile the rest of the day.)


End file.
